What Does a Hong Kong Company Pay in Its Second Year? Annual Renewal and Maintenance Costs
2026-08-30 | Chinglink Business, Licensed TCSP (TC009047) · Last reviewed 2026-09-15
What Does a Hong Kong Company Pay in Its Second Year? Annual Renewal and Maintenance Costs
Short answer: from year two onward, compliance-only maintenance costs at least HK$3,555 a year (company secretary fee HK$1,100 + Business Registration fee HK$2,350 + Annual Return government filing fee HK$105). If the company has real turnover, bookkeeping, audit and tax filing come on top, billed by turnover band, not a flat number.
Want the number for your own company? Ask on WhatsApp, and read the full breakdown below.
Three charges due every year from year two on
Item | Annual cost | What it covers |
|---|---|---|
Company secretary fee (Standard) | HK$1,100 | Annual Return preparation, statutory records, company registry upkeep |
Business Registration fee (government) | HK$2,350 | Renews annually, a statutory government charge |
Annual Return (NAR1) government filing fee | HK$105 | Billed separately from the secretary fee |
Total (excluding bookkeeping/audit) | HK$3,555 | — |
These three are due for every limited company, whether or not it has actual turnover. Skipping any one of them puts the company out of compliance.
[!important] The company secretary fee is not pro-rated by monthNearly all of the year's secretarial work — Annual Return preparation, Business Registration renewal, statutory register review — falls at the renewal date. Even a company transferring to Chinglink two months before its Business Registration expires pays the full annual fee, because the fee buys "one annual renewal cycle," not a number of months.
What if the company has real turnover?
Bookkeeping, audit and profits tax filing scale with actual turnover:
Turnover | Annual cost |
|---|---|
Dormant / zero-transaction | HK$3,000 |
Under HK$500,000 | HK$5,000 |
HK$500,000 – 1,000,000 | HK$8,000 |
HK$1,000,000 – 2,500,000 | HK$13,000 |
HK$2,500,000 – 5,000,000 | HK$18,000 |
HK$5,000,000 – 10,000,000 | HK$25,000 |
Above HK$10,000,000 | Quote-only |
Profits tax rate: 8.25% on the first HK$2,000,000 of profit, 16.5% above that — the government's statutory rate, separate from Chinglink's own fees.
No office address? Add the address fee
Address service | Annual cost |
|---|---|
Virtual office — Kai Tak | HK$1,150 |
Virtual office — Tsim Sha Tsui | HK$1,350 |
Companies with their own Hong Kong office address don't pay this.
Does the Business Registration fee change?
Yes. It's a statutory government charge, and the BR fee levy has been adjusted or waived across successive Budgets — it needs checking against the current year's actual schedule, not carried forward from last year's number.
A full second-year example
For a company with no office of its own and turnover under HK$500,000, year two totals roughly:
- Company secretary fee: HK$1,100
- Business Registration fee: HK$2,350
- Annual Return filing fee: HK$105
- Virtual office address (Kai Tak): HK$1,150
- Bookkeeping, audit, tax filing: HK$5,000
Year-two total: roughly HK$9,705 — less than year one because the one-off formation fee is gone, but higher than many clients expect "renewal should be much cheaper" to mean, because bookkeeping, audit and tax filing don't get cheaper just because a year has passed.
Frequently Asked Questions
If year one included audit, why does year two charge bookkeeping/audit again? The Complete tier's first-year bookkeeping and audit is a one-year service for dormant companies or those under HK$500,000 turnover. From year two, bookkeeping, audit and tax filing are billed fresh, against the company's actual turnover.
Are the Business Registration fee and company secretary fee the same thing? No. The Business Registration fee is paid to the government. The company secretary fee is paid to a service provider (like Chinglink) to handle the Annual Return and statutory paperwork. They are billed separately.
If the company has no turnover, is there nothing to pay? The company secretary fee, Business Registration fee, and Annual Return fee are all due regardless of turnover. A dormant company's bookkeeping/audit falls into the lowest band, HK$3,000.
Want the real number for your company's second year? Message us on WhatsApp with your turnover and whether you need a registered address.
Curious what year one costs? See how much it costs to set up a Hong Kong company from mainland China. For details on the secretary service itself, see Chinglink's company secretary service.
Questions about this?
Talk to a licensed company secretary — no charge, no obligation.
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